The severe frosts that hit Poland caused several serious complications on Monday. In Gdańsk, the Motlawa River froze for the first time in many years, at least 38 people have already died of frostbite, and meteorologists warn that the country is in for the coldest night of this winter. This was reported by the Warsaw correspondent TASR on Monday, according to the PAP agency.
According to the Polish Hydrometeorological Institute, the coldest night of this winter awaits the country on the night from Monday to Tuesday, when temperatures can drop as low as minus 29 degrees Celsius and the feeling temperature in some places reaches as low as minus 38 degrees.
The effects of the cold are also visible in police statistics. Since the beginning of winter, 38 people have died in Poland due to hypothermia, which is an increase compared to 16 victims in the same period a year ago. On Sunday, the bodies of two more people were found in an abandoned building in the Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship, and an investigation is to determine whether they died as a result of the cold.
At the same time, 54 people have already died from carbon monoxide poisoning. According to the State Secretary of the Ministry of the Interior, Wieslaw Szczepaňský, 8,600 police officers are involved in inspections of abandoned buildings, gazebos and sewer shafts.
Police also warn against entering frozen bodies of water. The sunny weather and the frozen Motlawa in the center of Gdańsk attracted many people entering the ice, although rescue services repeatedly warn that this is extremely dangerous behavior. The frost in Gdansk also caused technical problems. During the night from Sunday to Monday, there was a failure of the heating network, as a result of which approximately one hundred buildings were left without heating.
Meteorologists warn that the weather will change in the night from Tuesday to Wednesday. Especially in the southern voivodships, freezing rain and ice on the roads are expected in connection with the warming.
